


ouroboros

by orphan_account



Category: Original Work
Genre: Creative Partnership, F/F, Magic-Users, Spring, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:42:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24510094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The seasons trade hands, again and again.
Relationships: Winter Witch/Spring Witch
Comments: 3
Kudos: 5
Collections: Original Characters & Original Works Flash Exchange May 2020





	ouroboros

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jungle_ride](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jungle_ride/gifts).



In the early days, in the far northern corners of the world, there was nothing, so Mora set out to fill its great expanses. It had to be snow, of course-- perfect and all-consuming. Insular blankets of glittering ice were spread out and flat like white quilts, one after the other, until it was all the eye could see. Within days, dunes and drifts of snow covered the wastes, and the world was quieter for it. The world was already quiet, since it was just Mora, then, at the top of the world. Her alone. 

She took great pride in her work with which she was so meticulous. Wove careful webs, fractals of ice-- showered down from above, settled over pools of water that solidified them. She surveyed it all, where once there was nothing, and felt a great satisfaction with her work. The cold wind at her back was acknowledgement of a job well done, and it pushed her forward in search of more. 

The nights and the days, indiscernible from each other stretched on and on, and she worked further and further along the never-ending world until one day she reached the edge. The end. Mora looked back at what once was unending frost, and found that her work was done. It had left her feeling... Well. She couldn't have been sure how. Her mind felt like a complete white-out, all a blur.

So rather than feel, Mora curled up under the swirling winds at the top of the world and tucked herself into the thick bed of snow she had built for herself. Off she drifted.

\--

Another appeared one day. 

It was footprints she saw first-- Mora followed them. The trail was a long one to follow, but she walked easily atop the thick layers of snow, nearly floated over it. All along the trail there were peculiar little dots of green within the shadows of the prints, and the more she walked on, they began to break their borders and spread out. They were sprouts, she realized, as they grew before her eyes-- grew further out and up, taller and greener until it was an entire field, like a river flowing out to the open sea. Mora parted the waves as she drew closer, leaving an icy trail in her wake. 

Up ahead, in the midst of it all, was the other: a woman who traipsed lightly, without any thought at all, over all her untouched work. Her hair was long and lush, and it brushed the ground as she stooped low to pick up a handful of snow. It wasn't like Mora’s hand-- it was warm and the flakes melted without fanfare in her palm. Then it slipped from her hand as ice-melt to water the sprouts at her feet. 

Mora grew cold, colder, when she saw it. 

“Oh, it’s you!” the woman said, taking notice of her. She smiled, and that cold gripped more tightly at Mora’s heart. “Sorry to say, I can’t stay long.”

“Well you’ve made yourself at home while you can.” 

The woman nodded toward the tundra. “I see you have as well.” 

“Naturally. It _is_ my home.” 

“Perhaps.”

It felt pointless to argue, so she didn't. The desire to do so was quick to melt away from her, anyhow. Mora drew closer to the woman, who was carrying on about her work as if she weren’t even there. For the moment she was content to watch, and the woman seemed amicable to the idea herself. 

From a single touch of the woman's hand, life furled lazily forth out of the ground-- budding and bursting upward as it reached out to Mora, like a hand extended in greeting. She reached out to meet it.

“I must ask,” Mora continued, prodding the tip of what was now a near-budding flower. “Why?”

The woman echoed her softly-- “Why?”

The tip of the flower became overgrown with frost, and it sagged beneath the weight. Somehow she knew it would die soon. Out of the corner of her eye, Mora couldn't tell if the woman was upset by this or not.

“Everything was already perfect, already in its place,” Mora explained. “Why bother?”

A long silence stretched between them while the woman considered. 

“You seemed like you needed company. Something to do. Creation is the finest companion to loneliness.”

Being one of one, the “only”, Mora had never considered the concept of loneliness. When you knew nothing else, how could you? It's the sort of thing that one can’t recognize within themselves until another tells them they should feel it-- like the sudden realization that your tongue is resting uncomfortably in your mouth. Mora took pause, looking out at the sudden presence that had taken up residence over the fields. 

“What a companion I have.”

The woman smiled. “Best get started, then.” 

\--

True to her word, the woman was gone as soon as she came.

Long blades of grass caressed Mora’s face as she woke. It almost felt like a dream, but that green field was still around her, dotted with flowers as far as the eye could see. Not a single spot of snow remained, not one. For a moment that sense of a world never-ending returned to her, settled across Mora’s shoulders with weighty comfort. 

She stood and, without thinking about it at all, was compelled to move forward. The world was in great abundance all of a sudden, bursting with it. Trees had grown in, sharp and jagged all along the landscape, and she began to hang icicles from their branches with great tenderness. One here, another there, the pattern fell into place quite naturally. With great satisfaction Mora frosted the countryside, laid soft pillows of snow at the base of flowerbeds, casted drifts that crawled up from the base of the trees, that reached desperately upward to the tips of its branches. The days stretched on again, growing shorter and shorter until there was hardly a blink of light left. And before she knew it, Mora had once again filled the north.

A different sensation rested in her chest then, looking out at it all. Technically it was over, but it didn't feel like that, not really. It felt cold, a kind and comforting cold, as she settled down to tuck herself beneath the blankets of snow.

\--

“They’re lovely,” the woman whispered in Mora’s ear. It pulled her in like an embrace. 

Mora craned her neck to face the woman, and was smiling the moment she opened her eyes. Cold washed pleasantly over her when Mora saw the shine in her eyes. They were looking right at her before flitting quickly up to the trees. “These,” the woman clarified, drawing a warm fingertip delicately across the glittering ice that hanged there. “What do you call them?” 

Oh, those? Up there?

“Icicles,” Mora replied. “You like them?” 

“Of course. Is that alright for me to say?” 

Snow slipped off of Mona’s shoulders, out of her hair, as she moved to sitting. “I was hoping you would.”

“The better question, now, is what do I call you?” the woman asked. 

Mora told her. 

“Mora,” The woman echoed with a smile-- warm on her lips, wafted cold toward Mora. “Please, call me Prim, will you?” 

Mora shaped her mouth around the word-- Prim, _Prim_ \-- and it came with the ease of a puzzle piece slotting into place. 

“I wish I could keep them,” Prim said sadly while she took the icicles down from the tree, strung along a neat line like a beaded necklace. For a moment she held the length of it between her fingertips, examined it with fondness. It faded soon after into a mist, and then it was gone.

"I'll make new ones." 

Prim clasped Mora's hand in both of hers, "Oh, would you?" 

Mora couldn't help it, she laughed. "Of course I will. It's rude not to give you a gift in return."

She'd never thought Prim to have a serious face, but her brows set in a determined line as she mulled the words over.

"I’ll work harder, too," Tenderly, she rubbed her thumb over the tender skin at the back of Mora's hand. "Then you might be able to keep a part of me."

"For a little while."

Prim nodded. "For a little while."

\--

The countryside had grown back stronger while she slept. A den of trees had sprouted up over the clearing Mora woke in. They were different than the last trees-- fuller and stronger. Their leaves (they didn't look much like leaves, but they must be) were green waxy bristles and, when Mora pressed the tips of her fingers to the tree bark, they seemed largely unaffected by the frost that sprouted there. The branches were sturdy and could hold more snow than she thought was possible, and they leaned over her everywhere she went, reached out like a reminder--don't forget me!

How could she? There was so much newness to be seen-- the grass was sturdier, there were bright red berries that lingered for days where they used to wither after hours. Mora took the stem into her hand, and placed a delicate kiss to the fruit that had budded there. The frost bloomed, it grew, it spread, all along the fields that Prim had left behind for her. She breathed urging into the frost that made its home atop the shrubbery, over the flowerbeds and rivers, a message to Prim-- don’t forget me.

\--

"How could I?" Prim said with a laugh, taking Mora's hand in hers.

\--

The cycle continues, on and on-- a series of sleeping and waking, meeting and parting. There is no ruination between them; nothing is destroyed, nothing really dies. What they have is something that is built to be rebuilt, again and again, a collaborative effort-- created to take turns and trade hands, gently, slowly, so that their fingers can linger in the exchange. 

“What a fine companion I have.” 

And it grows and grows and grows.


End file.
